Ether options have been trading for a much shorter time compared to Bitcoin options, but the former has done an impressive job catching up with its predecessor. Bitcoin had dominated as the leading crypto options asset in the space, with billions pouring into it. However, the tide had begun to turn in the 3rd quarter of 2022 when an important update about the Ethereum Merge triggered a surge in interest for Ether options.

Ether Options Surpass Bitcoin 

Ether options debuted in the market back in January 2020, and it has enjoyed steady growth since then. However, no matter how much Ether options had grown, bitcoin options remained higher with open interest in crypto pouring into the pioneer cryptocurrency. Then in July 2022, Ethereum developers made an announcement regarding the network’s upgrade to a proof of stake mechanism, and this would change the game completely.

In July, interest in Ether options had ballooned, leading to a meteoric rise. It had packed at a new all-time high of $8.1 billion, which was more than 50% high than bitcoin at the time, with an open interest of $5.4 billion. From there until the present day, Ether options remain on an impressive uptrend, continuing to surpass bitcoin at each turn. 

Public miners sell more BTC than they produced | Source: Arcane Research

The rise puts Ether options trailing at 100% recovery compared to bitcoin, which continues to trail at 70%. It is the first time ever that the open interest in Ethereum has grown larger than that of bitcoin, and it is all thanks to the much-anticipated Ethereum Merge.

Is The Flippening Imminent?

The “flippening” is a word that has come to mean Ether surpassing bitcoin in value. Mostly, this school of thought has emerged following the fact that the performance of the price of ETH has surpassed that of BTC on a year-to-year basis. Hence, some investors expect the digital asset to flip bitcoin at some point to become more valuable.

There is no set timeline for when the flippening is expected to happen. However, each time Ether overtakes Bitcoin on any metric, the flippening debates begin. The same has been the case with the ETH options growing larger than BTC.

ETH declines to low $1,800 | Source: ETHUSD on TradingView.com

Presently, the price of BTC is still more than 10x that of ETH. So if there is going to be a flippening, then ETH would have to grow 1,000% while the price of BTC remains unmoved. This is unlikely to happen, given that the market actually moves with the price of BTC.

However, as the Merge draws closer and what is referred to as a “Triple halvening” is imminent, ETH will likely further close the gap between it and bitcoin. This event would see less supply of ETH in the market, giving it a genuinely deflationary model to be able to rival bitcoin’s limited supply.

Featured image from MARCA, charts from Arcane Research and TradingView.com

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